itchy itchy derailleur hanger

flesh wounds are itchy!!  oh my.  the antibiotics have definitely made huge improvements on the healing front.  what a difference a few days make.  the deep part of the wounds still has a disgustingly colored greenish yellow moistish scab on it.  i know, very pretty.  and the bruise around it is spreading and dissipating.  yummy.

the bike is out of the shop!  my derailleur hanger bent in the crash and broke when they tried to bend it back, as it should have.  and here's a fun story about how it got fixed.

but first...life lesson number one here, have many resources for bike repairs...when i first started this journey, my coaches very clearly said ensure you have a relationship with your local shop, your bike will be in there a lot.  at first i was skeptical, why would it be in there a lot, it's brand new.  naiveté i tell you.  here is the lesson, i absolutely have a relationship with my shop however, for some reason they are not open on tuesdays and they can't always fit me in, so i have developed multiple shop relationships.  what absolutely kills me is the people that service my time frame and time constraints the best is REI.  There is a huge part of me that recoils when i choose a major retailer over local business, but when you have to ride a metric on sunday and the shop wants to give your bike to you on monday, it just doesn't quite work.    so back to fun story about this weeks repair...

bloomfield bike couldn't take my bike, so i called REI, they could have it done by friday.  sweet.  brought it in.  they called me thursday morning and said hey, your derailleur hanger is bent, we can try and bend it back; it will probably break.  and here is the catch...if it breaks we can not order you the part.  crap...since REI is not an authorized trek dealer, no trek parts.  so i called my bike shop who couldn't take my bike.  they have the part, they think.  they ask me to bring the broken one.  ok.  so after work i went to REI grabbed the broken part, went to bloomfield bike, got the new part (their last one!), and then dropped it back to REI.  fun times...

here is what was interesting.  when i got the bloomfield bike i actually dealt with the owner.  same guy who sold me all three of the bikes we have purchased there.  i told him why i hadn't brought my bike in.  he asked if i has explained i had a metric, etc.  i said yes of course.  and instead of apologizing he told me i should have asked for a manager.  in my personal customer service opinion, i don't think you should ever have to ask for a manager to ensure you are being taken care of correctly.  it was kind of off putting.  so instead i told the team at REI that i truly appreciated them putting my repair on the important list and not only did they thank me, but it was incredibly reasonable for them to fix it.  $15 new part installed, they cleaned my chain and adjusted my shifter cables.  not too shabby.